Helen Polley (Tasmania, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Aged Care) Share this | Hansard source

I rise to speak on the Treasury Laws Amendment (Enterprise Tax Plan) Bill 2016. We are debating a bill that I have no doubt the government will be running away from as fast as they can. We have always been very clear on this side of the chamber that Labor will not support, and will never support, cuts of tax to the big end of town and to big business. This bill gives effect to a series of 2016-17 budget measures that were aimed at reducing company tax for small, medium and large size businesses. The bill contains three measures: reducing the company tax to 25 per cent, increasing the unincorporated small business tax discount and increasing the small business entity threshold. As I said, Labor does not support tax cuts for big business. In line without position, prior to the last election we said we would support company tax for small businesses with turnovers of less than $2 million. We will be moving amendments in the committee stage to reflect our position on these cuts.

We believe very firmly that now is not the time to deliver tax relief for large businesses. Let us remember that Australia is at risk of losing its AAA rating, and this government—the one that is on the government bench—is responsible for that. The time to give tax cuts is quite clearly not now. The government is trying to deliver a $50 billion tax cut for the big end of town. That, to me, demonstrates how reckless this government is, how out of touch this government is and how this government has absolutely failed the Australian people. It has failed with its leadership, because there quite clearly has not been any proper leadership when it comes to the budget or the economy.

They trumpeted around the country during the 2016 federal election, and their big chant was 'jobs and growth'. For those that are listening in, those that have been in this chamber for some time, would remember that the former member for Bass used to have his staff every morning do a chant, 'jobs and growth, jobs and growth.' They have failed. They have failed to deliver on all of those things. No jobs have been created. We have seen a blow out in the deficit and in the net debt. We have seen growth beyond trend, wage growth at record lows and underemployment at record highs and now they want to hand out a $50 billion tax cut. After such a deplorable and embarrassing year that this government had last year, we were all hoping that they would kickstart 2017 with a few goals. But, no, they have not done that at all. I want to highlight and contrast how this side of the parliament want to spend taxpayers' money, because it is all very relevant to this bill.

In a desperate attempt to save Christopher Pyne's seat in South Australia, and to hold their seats against the trend that is across this country—that the Australian people have lost confidence in them—what they have done, and what they intend to do, is undermine an internationally recognised and nationally recognised institution that is based in Launceston: the Australian Maritime College. What they are planning to do is spend $25 million creating another institution in Adelaide. Why? It is a clear cut case of pork barrelling.

For the last 20 years or more—right back from when I worked in the state government—there has been bipartisan support for the Australian Maritime College. A lot of federal and state money has gone into making sure that it is an international leader. It is highly respected. That institution trains the world's best seafarers. They ensure that we are recognised internationally. We have international students. We have the Australian Defence Force sending their recruits and their engineers. The Navy is a great supporter of the Australian Maritime College. Only recently, in this place, the Liberal Senate team joined with us in unanimously passing a motion that we would spend more of the defence budget in Tasmania. What have we got now? We have a desperate, dysfunctional government that is putting at risk and undermining an international college, the Australian Maritime College. This is how dysfunctional this government is.

This government is hell-bent on punishing Tasmanians, because they threw out the three amigos at the last election. They lost the seat of Bass because of an arrogant, out-of-touch member. What they are doing now is trying to take revenge on the economy of northern Tasmania. I know, Mr Acting Deputy President Whish-Wilson, that you would share my concerns about the Australian Maritime College being undermined and what that would do not only to Tasmania but to the economy of northern Tasmania in particular.